Exactly 10 years after the suspension of three US mortgage-focused funds signalled the start of the global financial crisis, the banking industry appears to be finding its feet. The banks in The Banker's Top World Banks ranking for 2018 recorded double-digit growth in both capital and pre-tax profits, a feat not seen since 2010 when it was working from a much lower base.
Together, the world’s largest 1000 banks hold nearly 12% more Tier 1 capital in the 2018 ranking than they did in the 2017 version, marking the biggest annual increase since 2009. An even more reassuring sign of the industry’s resilience is that capital is growing at a faster pace than assets. This is revealed by the global capital-to-asset ratio, a variant of Basel’s 3% leverage ratio, but which excludes off-balance-sheet items, rising 16 basis points (bps), compared with a more modest 6bps one year ago.